John Norman - Counter Earth01 - Tarnsman Of Gor

by Tarnsman Of Gor(Lit)

"Not slavery," he smiled. And I puzzled as to the meaning of his remark. Talena blushed and lowered her face, rubbing vigorously on the leather of my tharlarion boots.

  11

  The City of Tents

  FOR SEVERAL DAYS, TO THE sound of the caravan bells, we made our way through the Margin of Desolation, that wild, barren strip of soil with which the Empire of Ar had girded its borders. Now, in the distance, we could hear the muffled roar of the mighty Vosk. As the caravan mounted a rise, we saw spread far below us, on the banks of the Vosk, a sight of incredible barbaric splendor-pasangs of brightly colored tents stretching as far as the eye could see, a vast assemblage of tents housing one of the greatest armies ever gathered on the plains of Gor. The flags of a hundred cities flew above the tents, and, against the steady roar of the river, the sound of the great tarn drums reached us, those huge drums whose signals control the complex war formations of Gor's flying cavalries. Talena ran to the foot of my tharlarion, and with my lance I hoisted her to the saddle so that she could see. For the first time in days her eyes filled with anger. "Scavengers," she said, "come to feast on the bodies of wounded tamsmen."

  I said nothing, knowing in my heart that I, in my way, had been responsible for this vast martial array on the banks of the Vosk. It was I who had stolen the Home Stone of Ar, who had brought about the downfall of Marlenus, the Ubar, who had set the spark that had brought Ar to anarchy and the vultures below to feed on the divided carcass of what had been Gor's greatest city.

  Talena leaned back against my shoulder. Without looking at me, her shoulders shook, and I knew she was weeping.

  If I could have, I would in that moment have rewritten the past, would have selfishly abandoned the quest for the Home Stone-yes, willingly would have left the scattered hostile cities of Gor to face, one by one, the imperialistic depredations of Ar, if it were not for one thing -the girl I held in my arms.

  The caravan of Mintar did not camp as usual in the heat of the day but moved on, attempting to reach the City of Tents before darkness. As it was, my fellow guards and I earned our pay those last few pasangs to the banks of the Vosk. We fought off three groups of raiders from the camp on the river, two of them small, undisciplined contingents of mounted warriors, but the other a lightning strike of a dozen tarnsmen on the weapons wagon. They withdrew in good order, driven off by our crossbows, and couldn't have gotten much.

  I saw Mintar again, the first time since I had joined the caravan. His palanquin swayed past. His face was sweating, and he fumbled in his heavy wallet, taking out tarn disks and tossing them to the warriors for their work. I snapped a tarn disk from the air and put it in my pouch.

  That night we brought the caravan into the palisaded keep prepared for Mintar by Pa-Kur, the Master Assassin, who was the Ubar of this vast, scarcely organized, predatory horde. The caravan was secured, and in a few hours trade would begin. The caravan, with its varied goods, was needed by the camp, and its merchandise would command the highest prices. I noted with satisfaction that Pa-Kur, Master Assassin; proud leader of perhaps the greatest horde ever assembled on the plains of Gor, had need of Mintar, who was only of the Merchant Caste.

  My plan, as I explained to Talena, was simple. It amounted to little more than buying a tarp, if I could afford it, or stealing one if I could not, and making a run for Ko-ro-ba. The venture might be risky, particularly if I had to steal the tarn and elude pursuit, but, all things considered, an escape on tarnback seemed to me far safer than trying to cross the Vosk and make our way on foot or tharlarion through the hills and wilderness to the distant cylinders of Ko-ro-ba.

  Talena seemed depressed, in odd contrast to her liveliness of the caravan days. "What will become of me in Ko-ro-ba?" she asked.

  "I don't know," I said, smiling. "Perhaps you could be a tavern slave."

  She smiled wryly. "No, Tarl of Bristol," she said. "More likely I would be impaled, for I am still the daughter of Marlenus."

  I did not tell her, but if that was decreed to be her fate and I could not prevent it, I knew she would not be impaled alone. There would be two bodies on the walls of Ko-ro-ba. I would not live without her.

  Talena stood up. "Tonight," she said, "let us drink wine." It was a Gorean expression, a fatalistic maxim in which the events of the morrow were cast into the laps of the Priest-Kings.

  "Let us drink wine," I agreed.

  That night I took Talena into the City of Tents, and by the light of torches set on lances we walked arm in arm through the crowded streets, among the colorful tents and market stalls.

  Not only warriors were in evidence, but tradesmen and artisans, peddlers and peasants, camp women and slaves. Talena clung to my arm, fascinated. We watched in one stall a bronzed giant apparently swallowing balls of fire, in the next a silk merchant crying the glories of his cloth, in another a hawker of Paga; in still another we watched the swaying bodies of dancing slave girls as their master proclaimed their rent price.

  "I want to see the market," Talena said eagerly, and I knew the market she meant. This vast city of silk would surely have its Street of Brands. Reluctantly I took Talena to the great tent of blue and yellow silk, and we pressed in among the hot, smelling bodies of the buyers, forcing our way toward the front. There Talena watched, thrilled, as girls, several of whom she had known in the caravan, were placed on the large, rounded wooden block and sold, one by one, to the highest bidder.

  "She's beautiful," Talena would say of one as the auctioneer would tug the single loop on the right shoulder of the slave livery, dropping it to the girl's ankles. Of another, Talena would sniff scornfully. She seemed to be pleased when her friends were bought by handsome tarnsmen, and laughed delightedly when one girl, to whom she had taken a dislike, was purchased by a fat, odious fellow, of the Caste of Tarn Keepers.

  To my surprise, most of the girls seemed excited by their sale and displayed their charms with brazen gusto, each seeming to compete with the one before to bring a higher price. It was, of course, far more desirable to bring a high price, thereby guaranteeing that one's master would be well-fixed. Accordingly, the girls did their best to move the interest of the buyers. I noted that Talena, like others in the room, did not seem in the least to feel that there was anything objectionable or untoward in this commerce in beauty. It was an accepted, ordinary part of the life of Gor.

  I wondered if, on my own planet, there was not a similar market, invisible but present, and just as much accepted, a market in which women were sold, except that they sold themselves, were themselves both merchandise and merchant. How many of the women of my native planet, I wondered, did not with care consider the finances, the property of their prospective mates? How many of them did not, for all practical purposes, sell themselves, bartering their bodies for the goods of the world? Here on Gor, however, I observed ironically, bitterly, there was a clear division between merchandise and merchant. The girls would not collect their own profit, not on Gor.

  I had noticed that there was among the crowd one tall, somber figure who sat alone on a high, wooden throne, surrounded by tarnsmen. He wore the black helmet of a member of the Caste of Assassins. I took Talena by the elbow and, though she protested, moved her gently through the crowd and out into the air.

  We purchased a bottle of Ka-la-na wine and shared it as we walked through the streets. She begged a tenth of a tarn disk from me, and I gave it to her. Like a child she went to one or two stalls, making me look the other way. In a few minutes she returned, carrying a small package. She gave me the change and leaned against my shoulder, claiming that she was weary. We returned to our tent. Kazrak was gone, and my suspicion was that he was gone for the night, that he was even now tangled in the sleeping robes of one of the torchlit booths of the City of Tents.

  Talena retired behind the silk partition, and I built up the fire in the center of the tent, not wishing to retire as yet. I could not forget the figure on the throne, he of the black helmet, and I thought perhaps that he had noticed me and had reacted. It had been
, perhaps, my imagination. I sat on the tent carpet, poking at the small fire in the cooking hole. I could hear from a tent nearby the sound of a flute, some soft drums, and the rhythmic jangle of some tiny cymbals.

  As I mused, Talena stepped forth from behind the silk curtain. I had thought she had retired. Instead, she stood before me in the diaphanous, scarlet dancing silks of Gor. She had rouged her lips. My head swam at the sudden intoxicating scent of a wild perfume. Her olive ankles bore dancing bangles with tiny bells. Attached to the thumb and index finger of each hand were tiny finger cymbals. She bent her knees ever so slightly and raised her arms gracefully above her head. There was a sudden bright clash of the finger cymbals, and, to the music of the nearby tent, Talena, daughter of the Ubar of Ar, began to dance for me.

  As she moved slowly before me, she asked softly, "Do I please you, Master?" There had been no scorn, no irony in her voice.

  "Yes," I said, not thinking to repudiate the title by which she had addressed me.

  She paused for a moment and walked lightly to the side of the tent. She seemed to hesitate for an instant, then quickly gathered up the slave whip and a leading chain. She placed them firmly in my hands and knelt on the tent carpet before me, her eyes filled with a strange light, her knees not in the position of a Tower Slave but of a Pleasure Slave.

  "If you wish," she said, "I will dance the Whip Dance for you, or the Chain Dance."

  I threw the whip and chain to the wall of the tent. o "No," I said angrily. I would not have Talena dance those cruel dances of Gor, which so humbled a woman.

  "Then I will show you a love dance," she said happily, "a dance I learned in the Walled Gardens of Ar."

  "I should like that," I said, and, as I watched, Talena. performed Ar's strangely beautiful dance of passion.

  She danced before me for several minutes, her scarlet dancing silks flashing in the firelight, her bare feet, with their belled ankles, striking softly on the carpet. With a last flash of the finger cymbals, she fell to the carpet a before me, her breath hot and quick, her eyes blazing ,s with desire. I was at her side, and she was in my arms. Her heart beat wildly against my breast. She looked into my eyes, her lips trembling, the words stumbling but audible.

  "Call for the iron," she said. "Brand me, Master."

  "No, Talena," I said, kissing her mouth. "No."

  "I want to be owned," she whimpered. "I want to belong to you, fully, completely in every way. I want your brand, Tarl of Bristol, don't you understand? I want to be your branded slave."

  I fumbled with the collar at her throat, unlocked it, threw it aside.

  "You're free, my love," I whispered. "Always free."

  She sobbed, shaking her head, her lashes wet with tears. "No," she wept. "I am your slave." She clenched her body against mine, the buckles of the wide tharlarion s belt cutting into her belly. "You own me," she whispered. "Use me."

  There was a sudden rush of men behind me as tarnsmen broke into the tent. I remember turning swiftly and seeing for the fraction of a second the butt of a spear crashing toward my face. I heard Talena scream. There was a sudden flash of light, and then darkness.

  .

  12

  In the Tarn's Nest

  MY WRISTS AND ANKLES WERE bound to a hollow, floating frame. The ropes sawed into my flesh as the weight of my body drew on them. I turned my head, sick to my stomach, and threw up into the turbid waters of the Vosk. I blinked my eyes against the hot sun and tried to move my wrists and ankles.

  A voice said, "He's awake."

  Dimly I felt spear butts thrust against the side of the hollow frame, ready to edge it out into the current.

  I cleared my head as best I could, and into my uncertain field of vision moved a dark object, which became the black helmet of a member of the Caste of Assassins. Slowly, with a stylized movement, the helmet was lifted, and I found myself staring up into a gray, lean, cruel face, a face that might have been made of metal. The eyes were inscrutable, as if they had been made of glass or stone and set artificially in that metallic mask of a countenance.

  "I am Pa-Kur," said the man.

  It was he, the Master Assassin of Ar, leader of the assembled horde.

  "We meet again," I said.

  The eyes, like glass or stone, revealed nothing.

  "The cylinder at Ko-ro-ba," I said. "The crossbow."

  He said nothing.

  "You failed to kill me that time," I taunted. "Perhaps you would care to risk another shot now. Perhaps the mark would be more suited to your skills."

  The men behind Pa-Kur muttered at my impudence. He himself showed no impatience.

  "My weapon," he said, simply extending his hand. A crossbow was immediately placed in his grip. It was a large steel bow, wound and set, the iron quarrel placed in the guide.

  I prepared to welcome the bolt flashing through my body. I was curious to know if I would be conscious of its strike. Pa-Kur raised his hand with an imperious gesture. From somewhere I saw a small, round object sailing high into the air, out over the river. It was a tarn disk hurled by one of PaKur's men. Just as the tiny object, black against the blue sky, reached its apogee, I heard the click of the trigger, the vibration of the string, and the swift hiss of the quarrel. Before the tare disk could. begin its fall, the quarrel pierced it, carrying it, I would judge, some two hundred and fifty yards out into the river. The men of Pa-Kur stamped their feet in the sand and clanged their spears on their shields.

  "I spoke as a fool," I said to Pa-Kur.

  "And you will die the death of a fool," he said. He spoke with no trace of anger or emotion of any kind.

  He motioned to the men to thrust the frame out into the river, where it would be swept away.

  "Wait," I said, "I ask your favor." The words came hard.

  Pa-Kur gestured to the men to desist.

  "What have you done with the girl?"

  "She is Talena, daughter of the Ubar Marlenus," said Pa-Kur. "She will rule in Ar as my queen."

  "She would die first," I said

  "She has accepted me," said Pa-Kur, "and will rule by my side." The stone eyes regarded me, expressionless.

  "It was her wish that you die the death of a villain," he said, "on the Frame of Humiliation, unworthy to stain our weapons."

  I closed my eyes. I should have known that the proud Talena, daughter of a Ubar, would leap at the first chance to return to power in Ar, even though it be at the head of a plundering host of brigands. And I, her protector, was now to be discarded. Indeed, the Frame of Humiliation would be ample vengeance to satisfy even Talena for the indignities she had suffered at my hands. It, if anything, would wipe out forever from her mind the offensive memory that she had once needed my help and had pretended to love me.

  Then, each of the men of Pa-Kur, as is the custom before a frame is surrendered to the waters of the Vosk, spit on my body. Lastly, Pa-Kur spit in his hand and then placed his hand on my chest. "Were it not for the daughter of Marlenus," said Pa-Kur, his metallic face as placid as the quicksilver behind a mirror, "I would have slain you honorably. That I swear by the black helmet of my caste."

  "I believe you," I said, my voice choked, no longer caring if I lived or died.

  The spear butts pressed against the frame, shoving it away from the bank. The current soon caught it, and it began to spin in slow circles farther and farther out into the midst of that vast force of nature called the Vosk.

  The death would not be a pleasant one. Bound helplessly, without food or water, my own body would torture me by its weight dragging on the hand and ankle ropes, suspended a few inches above the roiling, muddy surface under the fiery sun. I knew that I would not, some days hence, reach the delta of the Vosk and the cities in the delta except perhaps as a bound corpse, withered by exposure and the lack of water. Indeed, it was unlikely my body would reach the delta at all. It was far more likely that one of the water lizards of the Vosk or one of the great hook beaked turtles of the river would seize my body and drag it and the
frame under the water, destroying me in the mud below. There was also the chance that a wild taro might swoop down and feed on the helpless living morsel fastened to that degrading frame. Of one thing I was certain there would be no human assistance or even pity, for the poor wretches on the frames are none but villains, betrayers, and blasphemers against the Priest-Kings, and it is a sacrilegious act even to consider terminating their sufferings.

  My wrists and ankles had turned white and were numb. The oppressive, blinding glare of the sun, the heavy weight of its heat bore down on me. My throat was parched, and, hanging only an inch or so above the Vosk, I burned with thirst. Thoughts, like prodding needles, vexed my brain. The image of the treacherous, beautiful Talena, in her dancing silks, as she had lain in my arms, tormented me-she who would gladly give her kisses to the cold Pa-Kur for a place on the throne of Ar, she whose implacable hatred had sent me to this terrible death, not even permitting me the honor of a warrior's end. I wanted to hate her-so much I wanted to hate her-but I found that I could not. I had come to love her. In the glade by the swamp forests, in the grain fields of the empire, on the great highway of Ar, in the regal, exotic caravan of Mintar, I had found the woman I loved, a scion of a barbaric race on a remote and unknown world.